BlueChilli

BlueChilli employs a full-time in-house team of designers, engineers, and product managers who build the first version of a startup's product. In exchange, the firm takes an equity stake and a board seat, operating as an outsourced technical co-founder. Traditional accelerators typically provide mentorship, a small cash investment, and access to investors, but do not build the product from scratch.

BlueChilli placed its BlueChilli Venture Fund into voluntary administration in December 2023 as part of an operational restructuring. The administration was triggered by difficult fundraising conditions for early-stage venture in Australia. The firm's core studio operations and earlier fund vehicles continued to operate, with the process aimed at restructuring the fund's liabilities and LP relationships.

BlueChilli is sector-agnostic within the broad digital-technology space but concentrates on enterprise software, healthtech, fintech, agritech, and climate resilience. The firm explicitly avoids hardware-dependent, capital-intensive deep-tech sectors that cannot be delivered through a studio-based software build — areas like semiconductors, advanced manufacturing, and drug discovery fall outside its model.

Sebastien Eckersley-Maslin, the founder, transitioned out of the CEO role in 2023 and remains on the board. David Coleman serves as Chief Operating Officer and leads the day-to-day management of the firm. The succession was part of a broader restructuring designed to separate the studio's operational functions from its fund-management activities.

BlueChilli operates a hybrid model. The firm manages external capital through the BlueChilli Venture Fund, which brings in limited partners, while also deploying its own balance sheet into portfolio companies. The studio services it provides are typically compensated through a combination of cash fees and sweat equity, giving BlueChilli a direct ownership stake in every startup it builds.

BlueChilli is headquartered in Sydney and primarily invests in Australian startups, though its portfolio extends into Southeast Asia and includes companies that target US and UK markets. The firm does not maintain additional offices outside Sydney, running its accelerator and studio programs from a central location.

The firm has launched roughly 180 startups since its founding in 2011. Two publicly identifiable portfolio companies are HowToo, an enterprise learning platform that emerged from the SheStarts program, and FloodMapp, which builds real-time flood forecasting tools for emergency management agencies. The majority of its graduates are pre-Series A companies operating in Australian and regional markets.